WMD drinking water Drenthe: quality and price

Reading time: ~11 minutes

What is WMD Drinkwater?

WMD stands for Waterleidingmaatschappij Drenthe, the water supply company of the province of Drenthe. It is the drinking water utility that supplies tap water to virtually the entire province of Drenthe, founded in 1937 and therefore in operation for more than eighty years. Unlike an energy supplier, you cannot choose WMD yourself: where you live determines who delivers your water.

For production, WMD has fourteen water abstraction areas, twelve drinking water production stations and about 10,000 kilometres of pipe. That last figure is why the answer to the question “how good is my water” never rests with the water company alone: between the production station and your glass lies a network that ends in the pipes of your own home.

Where does the drinking water in Drenthe come from?

From the ground, and exclusively from the ground. WMD says it uses 100% groundwater as its source. That is a fundamental difference from the west of the country, where drinking water is largely made from river water, and it immediately explains two things you notice in Drenthe.

The first is the composition. Groundwater seeps slowly through layers of sand and loam and picks up natural substances from the soil along the way: calcium, magnesium and a naturally small amount of fluoride. Together these minerals determine the hardness, and they differ from one abstraction site to another. In one place the groundwater contains more lime than in another.

The second is the pressure on the source. Groundwater lies protected below ground and is therefore less exposed to what happens at the surface. You can see this in the regional differences in tap water quality: areas on groundwater consistently score better on contaminants than areas on river water. The same pattern shows up in the water quality of Vitens, which also runs largely on groundwater.

Groundwater is not an inexhaustible supply. In June 2026, WMD reported that only about half the normal amount of groundwater was temporarily available in the Hoogeveen area, which meant less drinking water could be produced there. For a province that runs entirely on groundwater, dry summers are no small detail.

How hard is the water in Drenthe?

Across most of Drenthe the hardness of the drinking water is around 8 °dH, that is, eight German degrees of hardness. Drenthe tap water is therefore soft to moderately hard. That is neither coincidence nor luck: WMD removes part of the lime itself.

That last point is worth stating explicitly, because a persistent misunderstanding holds that Drenthe has hard water. WMD is unambiguous about it: hard water does not occur in Drenthe. Where the groundwater contains too much lime, it is softened during treatment to around 8 °dH. The lime released in the process is not discarded but reused as a raw material for industry.

Why does WMD not remove all the lime?

Because it is not allowed to. The Dutch Drinking Water Decree (Drinkwaterbesluit) requires total hardness to lie between 1 and 2.5 mmol per litre, that is, between 5.6 and 14 °dH. Full decalcification is prohibited by law. There are two practical reasons for that: a little lime protects drinking water pipes against attack, and removing the last bit of lime would drive the price of water up considerably.

At 8 °dH, Drenthe therefore sits comfortably within the standard and at the soft end of it. If you want to know how your municipality compares with the rest of the country, you will find it in the overview of water hardness per municipality.

Limescale does not disappear entirely at 8 °dH, by the way. Whether lime precipitates also depends on the temperature of your hot water appliance. WMD advises setting the boiler to 60 °C, which is also the temperature above which the legionella bacterium dies off.

What does drinking water cost at WMD in 2026?

Your water bill consists of three parts: a rate per cubic metre, a fixed annual amount, and on top of that the tax on mains water and 9% VAT. These are the amounts WMD publishes for 2026 and 2025.

The amounts in the table exclude the tax on mains water and VAT. The consumption rate rises in 2026 by eight cents per cubic metre, the standing charge by €8.50 per year. WMD cites investments and higher costs as the reason.

How much you end up paying depends mainly on your consumption. WMD works with an average Drenthe household of 2.16 people using 121 cubic metres per year. That is almost 332 litres a day for the whole household, and that covers all water: showering, washing, flushing the toilet and cooking. Drinking is only a fraction of that, as you will see if you work out how much water you need per day.

What do 1,000 litres of tap water cost in Drenthe?

A cubic metre is exactly 1,000 litres, so the answer is already in the table above: €1.14 in 2026 for the water itself. Add the tax on mains water of €0.425 per cubic metre, as it applied in 2025, plus 9% VAT, and you arrive at roughly €1.70 per 1,000 litres.

Per litre that is roughly a fifth of a cent. That makes the standing charge relatively heavy: at a consumption of 121 cubic metres you pay about €138 for the water and €122 in standing charge, so almost fifty-fifty. An average household therefore ends up at around €25 a month.

That ratio is exactly why saving water yields less than people expect: the fixed part keeps running. How the cost picture works out per water company and per way of looking at it is set out in the overview of what a cubic metre of water costs.

Is there PFAS in the drinking water from WMD?

In very small amounts, and less than in many other parts of the country. WMD reports that the presence of PFAS in the groundwater from its own sources is almost unmeasurable, and that what is found lies far below the limit. WMD meets the stricter guideline value proposed by RIVM, the Dutch National Institute for Public Health and the Environment.

That is logical given the source. PFAS spread through air and waste water into soil and surface water, so water made from a river is more affected than water drawn from a protected groundwater layer. Which techniques do and do not hold back PFAS is set out at water filter against PFAS.

One figure deserves attention here, because it is almost always missing from the conversation about PFAS and tap water. RIVM states, as WMD itself notes, that people do not exceed the health-based limit value for PFAS through tap water alone, but through food and drinking water combined. The split: food accounts for 83 to 98% of intake, drinking water 2 to 17%. So anyone worried about PFAS is looking in the wrong direction if they only look at their tap.

RIVM considers it responsible to drink tap water and at the same time advises that total PFAS intake over a lifetime should come down. More background can be found in the explanation of PFAS and forever chemicals.

What WMD does not control: your own pipes

A drinking water company’s responsibility stops at the water meter. After that it is up to the homeowner, and that is where the three things sit that even an excellent treatment plant cannot solve for you.

Lead pipes. In houses built before 1960 they may still be in place. When water flows through them, small lead particles dissolve, and too much lead can harm your health. WMD advises replacement by a certified installer. What lead in tap water does and how to remove it is covered at filtering lead from tap water.

Standing water. Water that sits in the pipe for a long time, for example after you have been on holiday, picks up taste and substances from the pipe. The rule of thumb is simple: let the tap run briefly until the water is cold. How long water keeps in a jug or bottle is covered at how long you can store tap water.

Temperature. The legionella bacterium multiplies between 20 and 50 °C. Above 60 °C it dies, hence the boiler advice. According to WMD, drinking water poses no risk at all; the issue is inhaling water mist, for example in the shower.

Do you need a water filter in Drenthe?

You do not need one, and we would rather say so ourselves than have you read it somewhere else. WMD states that Drenthe drinking water meets all legal requirements for quality and purity and that there is no need to filter the water before use. That conclusion is correct, and a blog from a filter shop claiming otherwise deserves your suspicion.

Why people in Drenthe still filter comes down to three reasons, none of which is about safety.

• Taste: WMD mentions this itself, and honestly calls it a personal matter. Some people simply prefer the taste of filtered water. What that means exactly is covered at what filtered water actually is.
• Your own home: old pipes, a long riser in an apartment building, or a house whose plumbing you do not know.
• The sum of it: RIVM advises bringing total PFAS intake down. You have little grip on your food, but you do on your tap.

There is one more point that is particularly relevant in a province with soft water. Softened water contains, by definition, less calcium and magnesium than the groundwater it is made from, and many filter technologies strip out further minerals on top of that. Reverse osmosis is the best-known example. That is exactly why we built the filter that gives minerals back after purifying: purify first, then restore calcium, magnesium and potassium via Swedish Mineral Rock™. What each approach does to your water is explained in the overview of which filter type adds something to water that is already clean.

Comparison: what the options in Drenthe deliver

The PureFilter Mineral+ costs €149.00 including the first filter. A replacement filter costs €65.00 and lasts about twelve months with 1 to 3 people, about six months with 4 to 6 people. The duo with two cartridges costs €115.00. Converted, that is less than one cent per litre. If you would rather not think about it, the Filterplan sends the filters automatically and on time for €48.00 or €86.00 per delivery. How often replacement is needed is covered at how often you replace a water filter.

At PureFilter we see that customers from Drenthe rarely call about limescale, which is exactly what you would expect at 8 °dH. They call about taste, about an old house, or because they read something about PFAS. Installation itself takes 5 to 10 minutes: you do not need a plumber, one pair of water pump pliers is enough to connect it to the cold water line, and you change the cartridge later with the supplied key. If you are hesitating between mounting on or under the counter, the comparison of a water filter system on or under the counter will help. An overview of the filters we supply for the kitchen is in the webshop.

Looking up the composition of your own drinking water

The figures in this article apply to most of Drenthe, but your postcode is attached to one of the twelve production stations, and those differ from one another. WMD publishes the composition per postcode, per quarter and per year, showing which production station supplies your water.

• The hardness per postcode area is on the page about water hardness.
• The full composition can be found through the composition tool.
• If you are unsure about particles in the tap aerator, WMD weighs in itself: it is usually lime, not sand.

The monitoring itself is strict. WMD takes daily water samples at the sources, in the treatment plants, in the pipe network and at customers’ homes, and has them analysed by the WLN laboratory. The Dutch Human Environment and Transport Inspectorate (Inspectie Leefomgeving en Transport) supervises compliance.

Frequently asked questions

Conclusion

WMD drinking water in Drenthe comes entirely from groundwater, is softened to around 8 °dH and meets all legal requirements. Hard water does not exist in this province, PFAS are almost unmeasurable in the sources, and no chlorine is used. That is a favourable starting position compared with regions that make their drinking water from river water.

The figures to remember: €1.14 per cubic metre in 2026, €121.89 standing charge per year, 121 cubic metres of average consumption, and a legal hardness range of 5.6 to 14 °dH, well within which Drenthe sits at 8 °dH.

What WMD does not arrange for you starts behind the water meter: lead pipes in older homes, standing water after a holiday and the temperature of your boiler. That is also exactly where a filter adds something to water that is already clean. People in Drenthe who filter do not do so because the water is bad, but because they want to decide the last few metres themselves.